


the only thing that keeps and takes you

by Meatball42



Series: Rare Pairs [75]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Bechdel Test Pass, Cynicism, F/F, Generation Gap, Grief/Mourning, Hopeful Ending
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-06
Updated: 2019-04-06
Packaged: 2019-11-14 19:28:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,066
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18058613
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Meatball42/pseuds/Meatball42
Summary: Dragged back to Asgard just in time to watch it burn, the last Valkyrie confronts a spectre from her past.





	the only thing that keeps and takes you

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Rubynye](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rubynye/gifts).



> Title is from Repetition by Purity Ring

The mood of the refugee Asgardians on the Statesman is low, even after the Vanguard arrives with a passel of warriors who’d been off having a scrap on Alfheim. After watching your home get destroyed, it takes more than a few familiar faces to pick up the spirits. Of course, no one asked Brunnhilde, but she’d have been able to preach them that lesson in no uncertain terms.

Brunnhilde finds a quiet corner of the ship to avoid the small fuss over the returning warriors. She brings a skin of wine with her. See, it’s alcohol, but it’s Asgardian. It tastes like home, and that’s not a selling point.

She still finishes the skin.

A bit of digging in the ship’s stores reveals some casks from back in Sakaar. Brunnhilde brings them back to her quarters, looking forward to floating off into a dizzy sleep. She can’t wait to be somewhere without the spectres of a dozen beloved Valkyrie, their essence recalled by a ‘vintage’ hairstyle, a sword with a ruby set in the pommel.

Familiarity breeds contempt, right? That’s why Brunnhilde had run off to the edge of the universe in the first place. She never asked to come home.

And she’s pretty godsdamned angry about it now.

When she opens the door to her quarters, another ghost faces her. She stops still, overtaken by the memories summoned from the depths of time.

A woman in armor is standing in her room, emptying her traveling bag onto the spare bed. She barely glances at Brunnhilde in the doorway. “Pardon me, but this room is off-limits.”

Brunnhilde can only stare for long moments, feeling a deep welling of rage, an emotion stronger than she even remembered she could feel.

“ _How dare you_.”

Brunnhilde’s voice is shaking. The fire alight inside comes from a place that she hasn’t touched in millennia: the memory of her lover. At the interloper’s waist is buckled a sword that Brunnhilde knows as well as her own. Sygra’s sword, hanging carelessly from the hip of a child who has never taken the oath of the Valkyrie, or even heard of them beyond legends, if Thor is anything to judge by. Brunnhilde wants to rip it off her.

Sensing the danger, the unknown warrior faces off with Brunnhilde, putting her hand on the hilt of Sygra’s sword. “Who are you? I know every citizen of Asgard by face. You are not one of us. How did you get on this ship?”

“ _I_ am not one of _you?_ ” Her voice is barely a whisper, a hiss as her face heats. “ _You_ are not one of _us!_ Where did you get that sword?” she demands.

The woman peers at her more closely. Brunnhilde has changed back into her scrapper clothes, because they’re much more comfortable than her battle armor, and is surely unrecognizable, but the woman lets go of the sword, anyway.

“You are the Valkyrie Thor met?”

“I am the _last_ Valkyrie,” Brunnhilde corrects, renewed pain making her speak more harshly than she normally might. “And that sword belonged to my sister who fell in the battle against Hela. I brought it back to Asgard so it would be protected.”

The warrior stares at Brunnhilde. Her hand cups around the hilt of the sword instinctively even as conflict grows on her face. She begins to breathe harder, which is extremely visible in her strange armor, which doesn’t properly cover her chest.

(If Brunnhilde is slightly distracted by the movement, it’s only to wonder when fashion started to come before defense for women’s armor in Asgard.)

In a graceful swirl of movement, the woman unsheathes Sygra’s sword and goes down on one knee before Brunnhilde. She offers it up in her palms.

“When Thor came of age, Odin allowed him and his closest friends each to choose a weapon from the royal armory. This sword was my choice. The king said I was the only one with a right to wield it. I never understood what he meant. But now I see that he was wrong. I am no Valkyrie. The sword belongs to you.”

She looks up at Brunnhilde, her sincerity reflecting in her eyes. Brunnhilde is struck by their clear blueness. Many Asgardians have blue eyes, but it’s less common on other worlds—worlds where the inhabitants have eyes, at least. But this woman’s clear gaze is matched with a sharp jaw and a pert chin, just like Sygra once had. When Brunnhilde looks at this woman, holding that sword… it’s almost like seeing her sister again.

“It was never mine. It belonged to one of the best women I’ve ever known. And one of the greatest warriors. ” She stares at the woman, who could have been a dark-haired child of Sygra, for all the features they have in common.

“Tell you what,” she decides after a long pause. “We’ll have a fight. Swords only. If you impress me—if you live up to Sygra’s name—you can keep wielding it.”

The warrior stands again. She’s taller than Brunnhilde, just like Sygra was, and she holds herself with the same regal air. It’s like seeing Sygra’s spirit reborn, from the sharp line of her nose to her earnest gaze.

“Sygra. She was the first one to carry this blade?”

“She forged it herself. We all made our own weapons, back in the day,” Brunnhilde remembers. She scowls. “I shouldn’t be surprised that Odin got rid of that tradition, along with the one where we let the weapons of fallen Valkyrie rest. I think Thor’s optimism is rubbing off on me.”

The woman laughs, and it strikes Brunnhilde in the center of her chest. In the last few centuries, few have managed to stir any real emotion in her. Hulk was the first for a long while, and even that bond was tired and tenuous compared to what she feels now, meeting this young warrior.

For the first time in a long time, she doesn’t wish she had died with her sisters.

“I, Lady Sif of Asgard, accept your challenge,” the warrior declares. In a softer voice, she promises: “I won’t let you or Sygra down.”

The Lady Sif reaches toward her and Brunnhilde clasps her forearm. They shake on it.

What Brunnhilde is feeling is new and could be fleeting, but… maybe, this once, she can embrace optimism.

“I’ll hold you to that.”


End file.
